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Editor: John Mortimer

Thursday, 2 March 2017

Uncertain times ahead for Bridgend Plant

It looks as though Ford Motor Company is set to reduce its workforce at
the Bridgend Engine Plant in south Wales, UK, by 2021 as Dragon begins to show its teeth and JLR pulls out.

The Bridgend Engine Plant currently
employs 1,760 members of staff, but the fears for the future of the site and
its staff has been steadily increasing.

There have been
reported the car company has drawn up a plan to cut the workforce to around 600
by 2021

The Ford production
plant has been based in Bridgend for over 35 years; production began at Ford
Bridgend in 1980. This came three years after the car manufacturer signed an
investment deal with the Welsh Development Agency.

Bridgend's first
engine was the CVH, which powered a number of models including Fiesta, MK2
Escort and the Ford Orion between 1980 and 2004.

Specialist
low-volume customers included the Morgan Motor Company which took from engines
built at the plant.

Volvo’s SI6 engine
was built in Bridgend from 2006 and used in the Swedish company’s cars until
2014. Land Rover also used it in Freelander.

Launched amidst doom and gloom

In 2008 the plant received a £70 million
investment, with £13.4 million in support from the Welsh assembly, and Rhodri
Morgan, Wales’s then first minister, said: "The factory was opened 28
years ago amid the doom and gloom of the early 1980s. This investment probably
means Ford will be making engines here for another 28 years."

In 2010, Ford
announced it would produce the new lightweight, compact and ultra-efficient
1.6-litre 'EcoBoost' engines at Bridgend and to be used in Ford's modern car
range.

In 2013 a £24 million
investment - with £12 million in non-repayable finance from the Welsh
Government - ensured continued [production of the fuel-efficient 1.5-litre
EcoBoost gasoline engine at the plant. Products from Bridgend now power Ford
Fiesta, B-MAX, Focus, C-MAX, Kuga and Mondeo models.

In 2015 Volvo called
a halt on production at the plant and next year Tata Motors is calling ‘time’
on engines made at Bridgend for its JaguarLandRover business.

The production of
the Sigma engine is to stop in 2019-20, and this led the Unite trades union
last September to express ‘grave concerns for the future of the plant’.

This was at the
time Ford announced it was going to halve the plant’s proposed production of
the new Dragon engine, due to begin in 2018, and “significantly reduce” planned
investment in the site.

Ford has confirmed
that instead of an investment of £181 mullion to produce the family of all-new,
technologically advanced, fuel efficient petrol engines, the initial investment
will now be £100 million with a workforce requirement of 550 and not 750
people.

Production set to end next year

With production of
the two engines set to end by 2020 and investment in the Dragon project reduced,
the plant has been plunged into uncertainty.

In September last
year Unite Wales Secretary Andy Richards said the halving of the Dragon
production and other pre-planned reductions "places the plant in a very
dangerous situation".

And Unite’s Bryan
Godsell said workers have been gripped by uncertainty: "The real fear is
that four years down the line what happens then because the programme with
Jaguar Land Rover and the Ford Sigma engine stops around 2019-20."

Last month a Ford
spokeswoman said: "Ford announced in September that it was taking the
option to invest an initial £100 million of an approved investment to build a
family of all-new, technologically advanced petrol engines at Bridgend from
late 2018.

"In addition,
Ford once again reiterated that the anticipated production volume of engines
from Bridgend remains healthy in the upcoming years, with associated labour
requirements expected to be similar to today’s level.

"Bridgend must
fulfil its commitment in terms of delivery, quality and cost of the products it
manufactures and – just as in the case for every Ford plant around the world –
winning new product contracts depends on the plant’s efficiency and global
competitiveness."

Dragon production
requires a workforce commitment of around 550 people, so staff have become
increasingly anxious over what will become of the other 1,300 jobs at the site.

Union issues a deadline

Len McCluskey,
general secretary of Unite, gave a 1 March deadline to Ford for reassurances
for the future of the plant, following meetings with car company's Europe chief
executive officer Jim Farley.

At the start of
February McCluskey said: "I am delighted to say that this was a very
positive, wide-ranging meeting, in which Mr Farley shared with us the company’s
future plans but also their concerns about the value of sterling and the type
of Brexit currently being considered, which would see this industry lose its
access to the European single market.

“Our automotive
industry is world class, and Ford is a big part of this. It was good to hear
Ford Europe’s chief executive personally express his thanks for the dedication
and loyalty of the UK workforce and that the company wants to work with us on
jobs and investment planning for the future.

“On the Bridgend
plant, talks are ongoing and I will be visiting the plant in the coming weeks
to speak to the shop stewards about the direction we need to travel to secure
jobs.

“Given the
turbulence of current times, however, we fully share Mr Farley’s view that the
sector must retain access to the single market on a tariff-free basis."

It was at this time
the shop stewards bulletin sent out to staff in Bridgend stated Ford bosses had
outlined a planned $1.5 billion investment for other UK plants over the next
five years, but had not mentioned Bridgend.